*** 2001 ***

It was like entering Diagon Alley for the first time, all over again. To enter a strange new world of beings like him, yet unlike him at the same time. The store was almost as huge as the library at Hogwarts. He stared at the books, all too many of the books even smelled about as duff as many of the Hogwarts library books. If not for the manager being a Muggle, he might have considered looking for a spell book amongst the long edgy rows of the shop. And even keeping that in mind, he wouldn't fully rule out the possibillity of finding one.

He looked at Adam who was talking to one of the men in charge and shuddered. The sheer threat of the man. He'd killed a man only hours ago, yet here he was, smooth and charming as if nothing had happened. Harry kept his hands in his pockets, holding tightly to the remains of his wand hidden inside the sealing. Adam had seemed extremely used to hiding things in coats. Harry hadn't dared ask why.

The Muggle Adam was talking to was an older man, gray hair and beard and once he came closer, Harry could see the stick in his hand was a cane needed for walking.

"He isn't one of us Joe. He's just a kid, a kid that needs help."

The Muggle seemed to try to get some kind of information out of Adam and was failing miserably. Harry could commiserate. A great source of information, Adam was not.
Harry tried to relax in one of the soft couches scattered around the room. It was a strange place this bookstore. A place of rest, to hide from the speed of the bristling metropolis outside. Here the noise of the cars outside was muffled by the solid wood of the bookcases lining the walls. You could barely smell the stench of the modern air outside through the thick scent of ink and parchment.
Almost, almost he could imagine that he was back home, at Hogwarts.

He tried to ignore Joe's stare. It seemed the Muggle was worried of what he might touch or break... Adam almost seemed amused, making the effort to stretch out at one of the coffeetables scattered around the shop and planting his feet firmly on top of one of them. Yet ... taking a better look at him, it was clear he was on edge, his feet placed just so ... that they wouldn't touch a single book on the table, his pose clear to jump up at the slightest signal of danger.

"We're just looking for a place to hide Joe. Somewhere where those bastards won't even think to look."

"Why?"

"They're after Harry, trying to kill him."
Adam stretched back a bit, his movement causing a crack in the chair.
"I promised an old friend that I'd look after him."

"Someone actually asked you to look after a kid? To have seen that day."
The sarcasm came dripping from the old Muggle's lips. Neither of them seemed to mind that he could hear every word they said.

"Severus ... he doesn't ask many favors. That and I owe the boy's parents. The kid's family."

Harry nearly slipped of the couch at hearing Snape's name.
"Professor Snape?" He whispered. That was impossible. In the first place the man hated his guts. And secondly ...
He couldn't come up with a second reason. Dumbledore trusted him.

"Severus saved me from a fate worse than death. That's a debt I can never hope to repay. Without him I'd be a slave to V... to..." Adam took a deep breath before continuing "to he who cannot be named. Severus saved my soul."
Harry recognized that moment of pain and terror in the other's eyes. He'd seen it before. Fear was a favored tool of Voldemort. The monster thrived on it, he swallowed it like a drug and fed on the hold it gave him over others.

"Voldemort."
Adam seemed to shrink just at hearing the name.

*** 1984 ***

Severus shivered as he looked at the muddied soil in front of him, barely looking at the hem of the dark lords robes. He'd grovelled and rolled in the mud for the dark master and now he'd be punished. All too be believed, all so the dark lord would not know of his treason.

Then there was no more time for thoughts, no more time for anything but screams of pain as the Cruciatus curse hit him. He let it out, yelling in a rage of pain. It didn't last long, but the end could never come fast enough. He fell down as it released it's grip on him and groveled in front of the master.
In disgrace before his fellows.

It had seemed so easy to say yes. So easy to follow Dumbledore's idea of returning to Voldemort and become Dumbledore's spy. But then ... Dumbledore wasn't the dark lord. He didn't know the hate that Voldemort held, his hunger for the pain of others. Yet, the pain ended and Severus stared at his master's feet, crawling up from the dirt, forgotten by the others, to scared to show even the slightest sign of empathy for a fallen brother.

It never ended, not here.
And for that, that alone, it would be every reason to stop him, worth every risk, every betrayal.
Methos would never stay free, not with the master after him. And if there was one thing about Severus ... it was his loyalty, that long stretching pull of a promise to dark brown eyes on a body filled with fire. Even death himself would not free him from that oath.

So he got up, and grovelled and the master would take him back in. And with every second he'd know his true reasons, his true purpose.